Happiness is Fluorescent Clothes and Fanny-Packs

I grew up watching Nickelodeon.

Like many other kids my age, I spent as much time watching a spasmodic offering of bright colors and yelling cartoon faces as I did, say, sleeping. I guess there was other things on other channels that I might have enjoyed watching. But Nickelodeon held a sickeningly tight grip on me. For nearly 10 years (ending vaguely mid 90's) I prayed many seemingly drug-induced hours to the Day-Glo gods.

Nearly every Nickelodeon program ended with a blurb stating that said program was recorded at their Mount Olympus:

Nickelodeon Studios.

A giant geyser of green water (slime, apparently) bubbled happily high above roaming droves of ecstatic children. The smiles on their faces were well warranted.

They had reached Mecca.

I have a friend who's family goes to Disney World (Land? The one in Florida, anyway) every year. Maybe I'm a poor abused child, but I never went to Disney world. The truth is, I never wanted to. Why go to Disney World when Nickelodeon studies is so close? The prospect of attending a taping of What Would You Do? and maybe even meeting Marc Summers held so much more appeal than having your picture taken with some dweeb in a Donald Duck costume.

Recently, I came across some news that killed my spirit.

Nickelodeon Studios is shut down. From the Wiki:

"The studio tour closed in 2001 after staffing cuts were made. The Game Lab portion of the tour would continue to run until Nickelodeon Studios closed in 2005.

The facility closed on April 30, 2005, after Nickelodeon had gradually moved its production facilities to Nickelodeon Animation Studios in Burbank, California, and New York. The final program taped at Nickelodeon Studios was Nickelodeon SPLAT! on August 17, 2004.

The Slime Geyser in front of Soundstage 18 was removed in May 2005.

The trademark "Nickelodeon" sign above the facility was removed in January 2006.

A time capsule buried by the network in 1992 in front of Sound stage 18 was removed in August 2006 and was replaced with concrete. The time capsule contained items deemed important to the children of 1992 as voted upon by Nickelodeon viewers, including a new Nintendo Game Boy, an issue of Nickelodeon Magazine and various other toys. The time capsule was scheduled to be opened on April 30, 2042, fifty years after its burial."

I remember when they buried the time capsule. I think maybe my whole generation sighed collectively, though subconsciously, when it was desecrated. The things that were important to us aren't that important, I guess.

Then again, Nickelodeon today isn't the Nickelodeon of my youth. Just watch the drivel they show now.

Maybe it's for the best that the golden age of children's programming was ushered quickly into Eternity instead of letting it die a slow, horrible death. Images of creepy abandoned amusement parks flash in my mind.

No, I'm glad that they didn't let that happen.